How to grow and care for English Ivy?

English ivy is one of the most easy plant to grow at home. Check the content and the video below to know more about it.

English ivy is a native plant of Europe. They are very much popular and found in different places in Canada, and the United States. These beautiful crawling plants can crawl up to the height of 90 feet. From ancient Greece to today’s date these plants are still in use to manufacture lots of medicines.

English ivy

If you want to increase the beauty of your house then English ivy would be a great option for your house. English ivy is a decorative evergreen woody vine. These are ornamental plants that are used to cover the ground or the walls. English ivy also looks great as an indoor plant and can be planted in an outdoor hanging basket as well.

English ivy is a European native that can grow up to the height of 8 inches as a ground cover. They are a good climber as well. Because of their aerial rootlets, they can climb vertically at the height up to 80 feet.

How to grow English ivy

You can easily grow English ivy from its branch itself. If you want to grow this beautiful plant then follow the following steps.

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• Take a vine of English ivy and cut it into small pieces of 4-6 inches long.

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• Place all the branches in a beaker half-filled with clean water.

• Now place the beaker under partial sunlight or near a window with access sunlight.

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• Wait for 10-15 days and after that, you can see some growth in the branch. If you can see some roots growing at the bottom then the plant is ready to move in the pot.

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• Choose a pot with a good drainage system and fill it with soil that can offer a good drainage system. You can use peatmoss and pear light mixture and if it’s not available then you can use your ordinary garden soil.

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• As the root of English ivy doesn’t grow deep so you can even choose shallow pot if you want.

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• Place the pot under indirect sunlight as direct sunlight can wilt and burn the leaf.

How to care for English ivy

Selection of soil

Soil is very much essential for the healthy growth of the plant. As English ivy is a leafy plant so we should use lighter soil. Garden soil may be heavy and thus may contain lots of sand or clay which has fewer nutrients.

You can get conventional potting soils from the market nearby. This type of soil has a mixture of different ingredients like manure, peat, and black hummus.

If you want to use garden soil then you can add a fertilizer. Get a fertilizer with a higher nitrogen mixture as they are great for leafy plants. So while buying NPK fertilizer make sure that the pack has a 20-10-10(N-P-K) mixture.

Provide indirect sunlight:

For the proper growth of English ivy, it requires lots of indirect sunlight. These plants require 6 to 8  hours of indirect sunlight. Direct and bright sunlight may burn the leaf. In winter if there is not proper sunlight then setup the artificial lights.

Appropriate temperature and location

For the proper growth of the English ivy maintain the moderate room temperature of 40-70 °F at day and 5 to 10 °F during night time. Do not place this plant direct sunlight. Select a shady place with little sunlight.

Feeding and Watering

English ivy does not need much fertilizer but if you think that the plant is not doing well or growing very slow then you can use fertilizer as instructed. It will be great if you can fertilize once a month during the summer and wintertime.

• For fertilizing you can also use slow-releasing nitrogen fertilizer. Take 5ml of nitrogen fertilizer and mix it into 1 gallon of water.

You don’t need to water the plant frequently. You just need to make sure that the soil is moist. Probably watering twice a week will be ok for this plant to grow.

Types of English ivy

There are more than 500 cultivars of English ivy and now can be found in Australia, New Zealand, Greece, and more than 18 states of the USA. Some of the popular types of English ivy are:

• Goldchild:

They are beautiful evergreen plants with medium size 3-5 lobed grey-green leaves with bright yellow border. They require full sunlight with moist and well-drained soil for healthy growth. They have a smaller mature size in comparison to other English ivy plants.

• Needlepoint

These are small and elegant plant with dark green leaves. The leaves are three to five-lobed with pointed ends. They can grow up to the height of 3ft and because of this height, they are ideal for growing into the basket.

• Ivalace

Because of their curly leaves, they are also known as curly ivy. They have got evergreen wide 5-lobed shiny leaves. They can be used as an indoor as well as outdoor plants. In the year 2011 ivalace was selected as an ivy of the year by American society.

• Tripod

As name suggested their leaves have got three-lobe. Each lobe is a long and pointed arrow-like structure. We can see tripod ivy doing great with trees and sheltered conditions.

Benefits of English ivy

Courtesy: Urban Jungle

English ivy has both environmental and health benefits. They are great ornamental plants that will increase the beauty of your house and garden. Besides that, they act as an air purifier and maintain good circulation of air.

English ivy is also used to treat some respiratory problems like:

• Asthma
• Arthritis
• Bronchitis
• Inflammation
• Other chronic diseases

*Important Note  

They are very dangerous invaders. If proper pruning and well maintaining is not done then they will take over all the area. They can even kill other plants if they get a chance to grow over other plants so we need to be very careful.

Be 100% sure before you grow them on the ground. Once they grow on walls it’s very very difficult to get rid of them. Their roots get deeply attached to the wall which provides very strong support to this plant.

If one cannot maintain well this plant it is highly recommended to just limit this plant in the container only. If pruned the branches should be well disposed.

Toxicity of English Ivy

English ivy is slightly poisonous. Every part of the English ivy is poisonous for both animals and humans. Consumption of English ivy may cause throat irritation, skin irritation, diarrhea, vomiting, rash, and fever. However, the berries of English ivy are less toxic than other parts.